A possibility I had considered is that Becky be yappin’, so she probably told Joss everything about Dina prior, either through phone calls or texts. And with Dina, she might have told her ahead of time since their meet-up with Joss seemed intentional, like “hey Joyce’s sister is coming to visit is it okay if we do lunch with Joyce and Joss?” and Dina was like “okay sure”.
I’m quite sure that Becky told Dina everything about ‘Josh’ helping them to break into her parents house. So giving her an update beforehand was inevitable. As to when she gave it, the possibilities range from ‘right after learning about it’ (cause she had to tell someone, who would keep it secret, to not burst) to ‘just on the way downstairs’.
And yet she’ll never have accumulated more sisters over the run of the comic than Joyce. Ironic, isn’t it? The one sister she couldn’t collect was herself…
I mean she’s still processing being one of the last to know and Dina (unintentionally) upstaging her at every turn. Jocelyne doesn’t seem to have picked up on that because I doubt she’d have reinforced that insecurity by proclaiming she wants another “real ass” sister if she did.
It is always a weird insecure feeling when you bring a friend to visit a family member and the family member spends most of the time complimenting them, especially if the family member doesn’t compliment you directly often.
I think Ethan’s “Tell her, ‘You will always be my sister” comment finally caught up with Joyce and she realizes Ethan was talking about Jocelyn and not Carla.
I think it might be Dina’s comment about them being inevitably wed…
Joyce is learning to be a lot more accepting, yes… but she may not have faced the gay marriage issue. She was raised on the insistence of “Man-Woman = Marriage”… so that might still be lingering.
(Our first reactions to anything is what we’ve been conditioned to do… it’s our second and beyond reactions are who we actually are.)
Her subconscious may be getting okay with the thought of 2 women getting together, or 2 dudes… but marriage is an almost mythical status that, again, she’s been conditioned to be insistent on. Heck, she started the comic with the intention of not getting an education, but to find a husband so she could be a stay-at-home-mom. None of this new acceptance thought was even on her radar… but she’s learning. (Had she not already met Carla, or learned about these things in her classes… she would have reacted WAY different to Jocelyne, I think)
She’ll check herself, deal with it, and be fine. But she’s going to have those few realization moments.
I actually think Joyce at that point was still more concerned with the *premarital* part of pre-marital hankypanky, than the gay part of hankypanky… like, “alright, people are born gay, i get this now, BUT THEY STILL HAVE TO FOLLOW THE INEVITABLE LAW OF MARRIAGE”
But if Becky’s your sister, and Dina becomes your sister, then, by the transitive property of sisterhood, Becky and Dina are sisters, and that just makes things weird.
Nice!
Now I’m conflicted. Is the relation irreflexive because one can’t be one’s one sister, or is it reflexive because one should treat oneself with the respect one would give a sister, i.e., The Greatest Love of All principle?
Joyce’s expression is functionally unreadable, but she’s wanted a sister all her life and to not only be told after her friends but to also seemingly be upstaged by said friends must not feel great. I’m sure it’s just some miscommunication but Dina suddenly stealing the sisterly affection Joyce pined for…..it might be a rough day for her.
Yeah, and no one’s actually deliberately upstaging her or acting with malice, they were just being themselves and having fun. I hope Jocelyne picks up on that soon and assures Joyce
Exactly, the others are chatting naturally, and yes, Joyce is capable of saying something that triggers a conflict. But it’s obvious that Jocelyne is going to notice that.
I think she’s just processing but in the end it’s a good thing versus jocelyne being bitter and just coming out only online and functionally cutting off everyone in her family and ppl associated , so she has plenty of time to bond and do ‘sisterly things’ together since she made a comment way back like “i’ve wanted a sister all my life”
i also wonder if maybe Joyce feels left out because she is the only non-queer person present (well, except Joe, but he has been very quiet, maybe for the same reason – being afraid to say the wrong thing or take up too much space). It can feel intimidating to not know enough or be part of something enough to actually feel included. Everyone else is bantering and bonding via mutual queerness, and Joyce does not know the script.
You know what we really need to pick this story up? For Sarah to appear shortly followed by Liz! That’s right. Let’s escalate this to an all out SISTER WAR! Then we’ll see who’s really the best adoptive sister/real sister to their shorter, possibly autistic, sibling!
Joyce seems to be uncertain about how many sisters her sister has, I hope they talk it out and Joyce doesn’t do something irrational to try to “prove” she’s cool enough to be Jocelyn’s sister.
Well, Dina is gay and autistic… Joyce is just autistic… But there might be some pictures on her phone right now that she could take advantage of to show how gay she is…
A squish is actually a platonic crush (in aroace vocabulary), so there’d be no slash involved (or the people involved would indeed find it squicky, unless there’s an asexual who is not sex repulsed and has a squish on someone allosexual and they chose to do slashy stuff together).
yee, it’s this belief in Christian sects where wounds called stigmata spontaneously appear in the same places they had on Jesus when he was crucified: the hands, wrists, feet, near the heart, the head, and back
according to their tradition, they are meant to symbolize one who’s lived a life of virtue akin to Jesus himself, taking on a burden of suffering for the benefit of others.
It’s fine for her to feel hurt that she was ranked less worthy of Jocelyne’s trust than Becky and Dina, but it’s fine for Jocelyne to make those determinations as a recently-closeted trans woman. It’s a conversation they should have.
The whole point of a sister-in-law is that they’re as much a real-ass sister as one you adopted. That’s why there was that whole kerfuffle around whether or not Henry VIII could marry his brother’s widow: in the eyes of the law – and this is Church law, so in the eyes of God as well as far as they’re concerned – if she’d consummated the first marriage, the second would be as much incest as if he’d shacked up with his actual sister.
I don’t have the strip(s) at hand, so if someone does, feel free to add the links, but Joyce has stated before that she’s always wanted a sister. I think Jocelyne was even present for that. I think that might be part of her last-panel reaction here. I wouldn’t be surprised if she’s also feeling insecure about being good enough as a sister, especially since Jocelyne tends to tease Joyce a lot but is being more openly appreciative of even Dina whom she’s only just met, but that can be talked out, I hope. Joyce has always wanted a sister who loves her, and she has one, but it might feel a little fragile right now, with everyone else in the middle.
Remember when we thought John might be cool too, before he set a record for how quick he let the mask slip that he was a homophobic douche that thought being gay was a trend, and that he skims from donations meant for the poor? Those were the days.
I think Joyce feeling hurt over being the last to know about her sister (and even realising thst Ethan, a guy she dated for about a week and met Jocelyn once was trusted with this information before Joyce, as well as Dina whose implied to have not even MET Jocelyn until now knew) plus looking back at Joyce asking Sarah if she’s going about Carla the wrong way and Sarah’s response being “you’re meeting everyone’s expectations (of you)” and Joyce seeing that as an “oh no” moment is leading to a lot of self reflection and maybe even another hard push away from who she used to be pre-college.
Ok so my brain is saying that Joyce is gonna try to be more like Dina because jealous. The consequence is that Joyce thinks that just means ‘perfect and gay’. In which case, poor Joe.
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Dino digga gonna teach them sisters to ride on a ball!!! ^^
*plays “Cha-La Head-Cha-La” from Dragon Ball Z CD on hacked muzak*
“You have sisters with fake asses?”
(did this damn Grav get fixed yet)
They’re very mulish.
X-D
it seems to be a confused sarah, so i think so?
Hey, now, it’s impolite to point out a woman’s fake ass, just like with fake boobs and fake hair.
Dina is not only the best character, she’s fully self-aware about being the best character.
Which is very rare, since people thinking they’re the best tends to lower their stock significantly.
It’s the difference between thinking you’re the best and knowing you’re the best.
and then there is being the best, like Carla. ~<3
I find the difference tends to be the former has unearned confidence, while the latter is always doing things to earn confidence.
Confidence is sexy, but only when it’s deserved.
Yes, but she is perfect on account of being autistic and gay so that works
she’s become Actually Correct Faz
Okay, so Jocelyne and Dina haven’t met before.
My guess is Jocelyne came out to Becky in a phone call and Dina just happened to be in the room at the time
A possibility I had considered is that Becky be yappin’, so she probably told Joss everything about Dina prior, either through phone calls or texts. And with Dina, she might have told her ahead of time since their meet-up with Joss seemed intentional, like “hey Joyce’s sister is coming to visit is it okay if we do lunch with Joyce and Joss?” and Dina was like “okay sure”.
I’m quite sure that Becky told Dina everything about ‘Josh’ helping them to break into her parents house. So giving her an update beforehand was inevitable. As to when she gave it, the possibilities range from ‘right after learning about it’ (cause she had to tell someone, who would keep it secret, to not burst) to ‘just on the way downstairs’.
I would assume Jocelyn gave Becky permission to share with Dina
Jocelyne is collecting all the sisters. She’ll pick up Sarah by the end of this trip as well. And maybe a few more.
“How many sisters we got on this strip anyhow?”
“YO!”
“…I knew it, I’m surrounded by sisters.”
Where’s all my soul sistas?
Lemme hear y’all flow, sistas.
And yet she’ll never have accumulated more sisters over the run of the comic than Joyce. Ironic, isn’t it? The one sister she couldn’t collect was herself…
That goes both ways, though.
The real sisters are the sisters we make along the way
Liz, too!
Jocelyne (later): “Pleased to meet you, Dorothy. Hey, Joyce, is she a new sister too?”
Joyce: “NO. I have…other plans for her.”
Jocelyne: “Wait, you have other plans? Or do the shippers have other plans?”
Greek Chorus: “Yes.”
Dorothy: “Plans…?”
Stares hard through the fourth wall: “What are you up to?”
Dorothy is to plans as Dina is to science.
I really want to see Dina help Dorothy embrace her autistic self T_T
There are too many sisters…..Don’t worry. Much like the line this references this cryptic threat will never be paid off.
“Do you know what you get if you feed a tribble?”
Fewer Klingons.
one of the best episodes of Star Trek DS9
I can’t tell what emotion Joyce is having in the last panel
Maybe feeling insecure, like she’s not cool enough to be Jocelyne’s sister
She was the last to hear about Jocelyn (in her mind) and now probably feels replaced
I feel like she’s remembering what Ethan told her, the ‘always be your sister’ line. The emphasis on that word makes me think it’s likely…
Yeah. And when she realizes Ethan also knew before her…
Joyce’s big sister wants different sisters that aren’t Joyce.
I mean she’s still processing being one of the last to know and Dina (unintentionally) upstaging her at every turn. Jocelyne doesn’t seem to have picked up on that because I doubt she’d have reinforced that insecurity by proclaiming she wants another “real ass” sister if she did.
It is always a weird insecure feeling when you bring a friend to visit a family member and the family member spends most of the time complimenting them, especially if the family member doesn’t compliment you directly often.
Jealousy intensifies.
euphoria is a bit blinding
I think Ethan’s “Tell her, ‘You will always be my sister” comment finally caught up with Joyce and she realizes Ethan was talking about Jocelyn and not Carla.
Yep that’s what I’m thinking too
Yeah. And when she realizes Ethan also knew before her…
I think it might be Dina’s comment about them being inevitably wed…
Joyce is learning to be a lot more accepting, yes… but she may not have faced the gay marriage issue. She was raised on the insistence of “Man-Woman = Marriage”… so that might still be lingering.
(Our first reactions to anything is what we’ve been conditioned to do… it’s our second and beyond reactions are who we actually are.)
Her subconscious may be getting okay with the thought of 2 women getting together, or 2 dudes… but marriage is an almost mythical status that, again, she’s been conditioned to be insistent on. Heck, she started the comic with the intention of not getting an education, but to find a husband so she could be a stay-at-home-mom. None of this new acceptance thought was even on her radar… but she’s learning. (Had she not already met Carla, or learned about these things in her classes… she would have reacted WAY different to Jocelyne, I think)
She’ll check herself, deal with it, and be fine. But she’s going to have those few realization moments.
She’s already RPed being married to Dorothy…
Joyce’s reaction to Becky & Dina’s potential marriage already happened: https://www.dumbingofage.com/2023/comic/book-13/02-turning-saints-into-the-sea/kindasorta/
I don’t think so. Becky and Dina getting married in the future has been brought up before. Joyce has no problem with it.
She rather celebrated it. With a high-pitch frequency joy(ce)ous shout that only dogs could hear.
I think even a few of the dogs were asking each other: “do you hear something? I’m not quite sure….”
Hmmm… then I’m stuck on what it might mean.
I love when people post paragraphs of analysis based on a single expression lmfao
Honestly I don’t think its the wedding thing, I think she might be feeling a bit jealous and insecure.
I actually think Joyce at that point was still more concerned with the *premarital* part of pre-marital hankypanky, than the gay part of hankypanky… like, “alright, people are born gay, i get this now, BUT THEY STILL HAVE TO FOLLOW THE INEVITABLE LAW OF MARRIAGE”
I don’t know if she’s thinking about right now, but I expect it will be on her mind sooner or later. Especially after she figures out Ethan knew too. And I presume nobody has told her about Jordan yet.
Aww Joyce. Lotta stuff is changing again
Joyce is feeling? Neglected? Abandoned? Left for dead?
“You let her know that she is– and has always been– your sister.”
A wizard is never lame. Nor is he tryhard. He always comes off exactly as cool as he means to.
Well, sure, if you got the likes of Sir Christopher Lee and Sir Ian McKellen portraying you. 😀
But if Becky’s your sister, and Dina becomes your sister, then, by the transitive property of sisterhood, Becky and Dina are sisters, and that just makes things weird.
Not how chosen family works at all
A non-transitive relation.
Nice!
Now I’m conflicted. Is the relation irreflexive because one can’t be one’s one sister, or is it reflexive because one should treat oneself with the respect one would give a sister, i.e., The Greatest Love of All principle?
I’ve had chosen family where the resulting lack of social pressure to have sexual or romantic opinions about each other was a large selling point.
So chosen family can work like that if the choosers want it to.
Joyce’s expression is functionally unreadable, but she’s wanted a sister all her life and to not only be told after her friends but to also seemingly be upstaged by said friends must not feel great. I’m sure it’s just some miscommunication but Dina suddenly stealing the sisterly affection Joyce pined for…..it might be a rough day for her.
Yeah, and no one’s actually deliberately upstaging her or acting with malice, they were just being themselves and having fun. I hope Jocelyne picks up on that soon and assures Joyce
Exactly, the others are chatting naturally, and yes, Joyce is capable of saying something that triggers a conflict. But it’s obvious that Jocelyne is going to notice that.
I hope they get to have a one-on-one about this. Maybe later when one of them broaches the subject of their parents’ reactions…
Honestly some time with just the two of them is probably called for even if they don’t discuss this specifically.
I think she’s just processing but in the end it’s a good thing versus jocelyne being bitter and just coming out only online and functionally cutting off everyone in her family and ppl associated , so she has plenty of time to bond and do ‘sisterly things’ together since she made a comment way back like “i’ve wanted a sister all my life”
i also wonder if maybe Joyce feels left out because she is the only non-queer person present (well, except Joe, but he has been very quiet, maybe for the same reason – being afraid to say the wrong thing or take up too much space). It can feel intimidating to not know enough or be part of something enough to actually feel included. Everyone else is bantering and bonding via mutual queerness, and Joyce does not know the script.
Joyce: That’s a big HECK NO, Joss-ter! I have lost a LOT of my hangups recently, but incest is still a hard NO!
*Off to one side, Becky’s face turns red, steam starts to rise from her collar*
*Dina walks over*
Dina: You are imagining having sex with me as your sister.
Becky: Hey, the lure of the forbidden is powerful!
D: But, you have no experience of having siblings… I see. You are imagining having sex with me as Joyce.
B: Y- you still love me, right?
D: I do.
B: Thank God!
THREE WAY!
THREE WAY!
THREE WAY!
Dina is not the perfection we deserve, but the perfection we need.
…Alright, this broke me. Congratulations, you won, now GET OUT
You know what we really need to pick this story up? For Sarah to appear shortly followed by Liz! That’s right. Let’s escalate this to an all out SISTER WAR! Then we’ll see who’s really the best adoptive sister/real sister to their shorter, possibly autistic, sibling!
Sisters before Misters!
Joyce; lets just adopt most of the female cast at this point.
But _not_ Dorothy. We have other needs for Dorothy.
Being related to the President would DEFINITELY be too much stress!!
no less than a King, a president and those close to them live as though a knife is dangling over their heads by a horse hair at all times
in the end, a King who is liable for being replaced every 4 years is still a King
Joyce seems to be uncertain about how many sisters her sister has, I hope they talk it out and Joyce doesn’t do something irrational to try to “prove” she’s cool enough to be Jocelyn’s sister.
Oh who am I kidding she’s Joyce
Exactly, the question here is….
How will she demonstrate?
Well, Dina is gay and autistic… Joyce is just autistic… But there might be some pictures on her phone right now that she could take advantage of to show how gay she is…
“I’m queer too! See? My best friend sends me boobs pictures! And she taught me how to jill off!”
I was thinking: borrow Sal’s jacket again.
I approve this message.
Joyce must introduce her other sister!
starting to get a big ass sorority, huh, Joyce
But that would make the inevitable wedding incestuous.
Is “adoptcest” an established fetish?
Yes
You had to ask?
That isn’t how chosen family works.
To remove ambiguity, we could develop a new vocabulary for chosen family. I nominate “chosis” and “chobro”.
I was thinking the same. I was like “Jocelyn, no! Bad idea. Let them get normal married.”
Being exactly as cool as you choose to be is *super* cool. Keep up the good work, Dina.
I think she’s remembering Ambers Wisdom here on this,
that its squishy to slash your adopted family
er squicky
And squishy!
A squish is actually a platonic crush (in aroace vocabulary), so there’d be no slash involved (or the people involved would indeed find it squicky, unless there’s an asexual who is not sex repulsed and has a squish on someone allosexual and they chose to do slashy stuff together).
Oh no: last panel with action going to the left (Joyce walking), instead right.
You can left Christianity, but the stigma never left you…
what??
Stigma, pl. stigmata: Jesus’s wounds from being crucified.
yee, it’s this belief in Christian sects where wounds called stigmata spontaneously appear in the same places they had on Jesus when he was crucified: the hands, wrists, feet, near the heart, the head, and back
according to their tradition, they are meant to symbolize one who’s lived a life of virtue akin to Jesus himself, taking on a burden of suffering for the benefit of others.
I don’t see why not, Joyce has already adopted half the female cast as a sister.
Noone is at fault here.
But Joyce is right to feel a bit betrayed with all of this, isn’t she?
I mean, she can feel however she feels.
It’s fine for her to feel hurt that she was ranked less worthy of Jocelyne’s trust than Becky and Dina, but it’s fine for Jocelyne to make those determinations as a recently-closeted trans woman. It’s a conversation they should have.
Personally I think the last panel is the look of realisation and not anything negative.
I think so too. The “two and two together” that Ethan knew and ~that’s~ what he was trying to say to Joyce.
The whole point of a sister-in-law is that they’re as much a real-ass sister as one you adopted. That’s why there was that whole kerfuffle around whether or not Henry VIII could marry his brother’s widow: in the eyes of the law – and this is Church law, so in the eyes of God as well as far as they’re concerned – if she’d consummated the first marriage, the second would be as much incest as if he’d shacked up with his actual sister.
Different church.
I mean, some cultures have a thing with marrying your brother’s widow so I imagine different cultures have different interpretations.
It’s like they never read MT 22:23-30.
I don’t have the strip(s) at hand, so if someone does, feel free to add the links, but Joyce has stated before that she’s always wanted a sister. I think Jocelyne was even present for that. I think that might be part of her last-panel reaction here. I wouldn’t be surprised if she’s also feeling insecure about being good enough as a sister, especially since Jocelyne tends to tease Joyce a lot but is being more openly appreciative of even Dina whom she’s only just met, but that can be talked out, I hope. Joyce has always wanted a sister who loves her, and she has one, but it might feel a little fragile right now, with everyone else in the middle.
Ask and you shall receive! granted I didn’t get every time she’s mentioned a sister(which would be like half of anytime she’s with Sarah) but I did find when she mentioned it around Joss! https://www.dumbingofage.com/2016/comic/book-6/03-when-god-closes-the-door/india/
Remember when we thought John might be cool too, before he set a record for how quick he let the mask slip that he was a homophobic douche that thought being gay was a trend, and that he skims from donations meant for the poor? Those were the days.
“Hey Joyce good news” took a little while to come to fruition. But here we are!
Jeez, Jocelyn. Leave some sisters for everyone else.
Could be worse, Joyce: nobody’s trying to make Joe an honorary sister.
I like that Joyce is talking up her cool friend.
They should hug.
I think Joyce feeling hurt over being the last to know about her sister (and even realising thst Ethan, a guy she dated for about a week and met Jocelyn once was trusted with this information before Joyce, as well as Dina whose implied to have not even MET Jocelyn until now knew) plus looking back at Joyce asking Sarah if she’s going about Carla the wrong way and Sarah’s response being “you’re meeting everyone’s expectations (of you)” and Joyce seeing that as an “oh no” moment is leading to a lot of self reflection and maybe even another hard push away from who she used to be pre-college.
Aww… 🙁
That’s a good quote. I am exactly as cool as I choose to be which inadvertently arrives at an enviable amount. I’m gonna use that.
“Sorry Jocelyne, we have reached the maximum of possible sisters, because i accidentally started insisting Carla was my sister.”
‘Dina [Last Name]: An Enviable Amount of Cool’ sounds like a great biography title.
in this universe she’s Dina Saruyama ^^
(I’m not on Bluesky so I’ll post here)
So sorry about Miss Sakaki, Willises. 🙁 Sometimes the kindest thing you can do is say goodbye, even when it shatters you to pieces.
😭😭😭🫂🫂🫂 May she have the happiest adventures in the Final Unknown
*plays “Tapha Niang” by Toumani Diabate on passing car radio*
Ok so my brain is saying that Joyce is gonna try to be more like Dina because jealous. The consequence is that Joyce thinks that just means ‘perfect and gay’. In which case, poor Joe.
Oh I’m Joyce now. Cool.
Just like the fucking SpongeBob episode where Patrick starts copying SpongeBob because he wants to win a trophy so bad XD
And we have a book title. “I am exactly as cool as I choose to be, which inadvertantly arrives at an enviable amount.”